


In my dreams

by isa_belle



Series: Dream smp [5]
Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Dreams and Nightmares, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, I'm Bad At Tagging, philza being a good dad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 06:14:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28346703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isa_belle/pseuds/isa_belle
Summary: Sometimes, when the moon is high in the night sky and the bitter cold wind of the freezing outdoor winds its way into his corner of the house, seeping through cracks in wooden doors and biting his skin while he rests, Tommy dreams of Wilbur.
Relationships: TommyInnit & Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Wilbur Soot & Technoblade & TommyInnit & Phil Watson, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit & Phil Watson
Series: Dream smp [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2068152
Comments: 8
Kudos: 95





	In my dreams

**Author's Note:**

> i am taking full advantage of the fact that phil broke out of house arrest and is at techno’s house now. 
> 
> anyway, please enjoy the products of my three am insomnia induced writing spree

Sometimes, when the moon is high in the night sky and the bitter cold wind of the freezing outdoor winds its way into his corner of the house, seeping through cracks in wooden doors and biting his skin while he rests, Tommy dreams of Wilbur. 

Or- _ Alivebur_, as it were. And they’re not dreams so much I as they’re nightmares. 

Sometimes they’re in Pogtopia, with its lanterns and tunnels and cold walls. Sometimes they’re in Logstedshire, with tents and craters and towers that go up and up until they’re lost in the clouds. Sometimes they’re in the nether, Tommy on the edge of a bridge, lava popping beneath him. But they’re never in L’manburg. Even in his own dreams Tommy can’t go home. 

Wil stands in his periphery, just over his shoulder. Tommy can’t focus on his face, but he can notice the way his clothes seem to flicker in a funny way. From a uniform of blue and gold to a dirty trench coat. It makes his head hurt to see. He says “Tommy I want you to do whatever your heart tells you” then “let’s be the bad guys,” all in the same breath. It leaves Tommy’s head spinning as he wakes, disoriented and confused. Tears on his cheeks and shaking fingers, bile on his tongue. 

Some nights Wilbur yells at him, ragged voice and balled up fists. A static air around him, clad in trench coat with the backdrop of Pogtopia’s echoing walls. Tells him it’s his fault. That Tommy wasn’t enough to keep his head on straight. He’s aggressive in the way he was back then, with violent and brash movements. Shoving a little to hard, laughing a little too loud. Tommy never used to fear his brother, but that manic look in his eyes was always enough to keep Tommy on his toes. He thinks,  _Wilbur wouldn’t hurt me_. Then he remembers the pit and the taunting laugher. Tommy can’t move in those dreams. His feet are glued to the ground as Wilbur blows through, a hurricane of bitter red. 

“Tommy Innit, you’re scared,” he says, and the walls whisper it with him. Wilbur’s voice is like venom, bouncing off stone. It’s agonizing. His own mind, his own memories, they’re agonizing. He longs for the person his brother used to be. His soft and easy smiles, the strum of a guitar in the meadow of L’manburg, the light on his face when he looked at his son. He sees it in his eyes sometimes, that glint, the flicker of the real Wilbur, buried under mountains of rage and revenge and paranoia. But that only serves to make it harder to watch as he frays and falls apart. 

Some nights his dreams are calmer. They’re in Logstead. Tommy knows logically that Wilbur’s never been there. He died before Tommy’s exile was even a thought. But they sit on a bench over looking the ocean, feet dangling just above the waves. The sun sets over the horizon, slow and silent and familiar. Sometimes if he looks hard, for just a second, the water turns to grass, and the empty sky turns into L’manburg and Fundy is burning the flag while Wilbur cries at his side. But then it snaps back to blurry orange and purple. “We haven’t hung out like this in a while.” Says Wilbur. Borrowed dialogue. Words Tommy’s heard before. It’s never anything new, his dreams are just misplaced memories. 

Tommy just nods, as the wind blows the smell of soot and ash into his nose where there should be the salt of the ocean. Wilbur is bleeding, blood on his lips and his stomach. Tommy just tries not to look and begs to wake up because it’s always so hard. The calm dreams aren’t any better than the violent ones. Sullen numbness isn’t any better than rage. It’s all it’s own brand of torture. 

Sometimes Tommy is falling, falling past cobblestone bridges and obsidian and glowstone so fast they’re only blurs as he plummets. Sometimes Tommy falls because he jumped. Sometimes Tommy falls because Wilbur pushed him. But in the nether, Tommy always falls. 

It’s hard to think as he does. His hair blows wild as the wind rushes past his ears, his limbs are heavy. 

He cries tears of lava, fire from his eyes, molten and red hot against his cheeks. He hears Wilbur laugh at him. He hears Wilbur cry for him. He wears Wilbur’s coat, loose over his shoulders. He can’t decide if it’s a comfort or not. He doesn’t want to become Wilbur. But doesn’t want to lose him either. 

His feeling are tangled and confused and he hates to think about these things, but his mind pushes them to the forefront as soon as his eyelids shut. 

One night he dreams and wakes panting and shaking, a scream in his throat. Phil stands over him, hand on his shoulder, face twisted in worry. Techno’s house is warmer with Phil in it, but right now all Tommy feels is cold cold cold. 

“Phil?” He breathes, “what are you doing?”

Phil keeps that same expression of worry on his face. “You were talking in your sleep, you sounded like you were having a nightmare.”

Tommy blinks at him, eyes adjusting to the darkness of the room. “I was, I think.” He leans against Phil’s hand a little, almost against his will. 

“About what?”

Tommy swallows, “Wilbur.”

Then Phil’s face falls into something different. Less readable. His eyes go a bit fuzzy. The worry melts into something sadder and Tommy feels guilty for a moment before Phil gently tugs him into a hug. 

“I’m okay, Phil.” Tommy says, but his voice is shaky and watery as he does. Even he’s not convinced. Philza laughs a strange laugh. 

“You’re crying, Toms.”

“Oh.” He says. “Am I?” Phil just hums, holds him tightly. Tommy feels warm. He wonders if this is what Wilbur felt while he was dying. He wonders if he felt this safe. 

“Do you wanna talk about it?” He asks, after a moment. And Tommy thinks. He doesn’t know how to articulate what he’s feeling. Everything is fucked up and messy. The good memories sit too close to the bad ones. There’s too much overlap for any of it to make sense. 

“I don’t know how. It’s confusing and it makes my brain all spinny and shit.”

“That’s okay,” says Phil, “it is confusing. You don’t have to understand it.”

“Okay.” Tommy knows he’s crying now, throat hallow and quivering lip. Not dramatic sobs, just quiet, little tears, that soak through Phil’s shirt. They stay like that for a bit, father and son in mourning. Their comfort is strange in the same way that everything is. 

“Dad?” Tommy pulls away and stares off into the darkness of the room. 

“Mm?” Philza’s face is shadowed by the night but Tommy thinks there might be tears on it too. 

“Was Wilbur a good person?”

The question sits still in the air for a moment, both of them staring at it before it lands. Phil sighs, runs a hand through is hair. “I don’t know Tommy, it’s a complicated thing. What do you think?”

Tommy huffs. “That’s what I’m trying to figure out. I think he used to be. But I think he got lost somewhere along the way, ya know?”

Phil gives him this sad smile, puts his hand on his shoulder again and stares off into the empty room. “I do, Tommy.”

Tommy looks away from his face, eyes locking on the blankets as he feels guilt bubble up in him. “Do you think it’s my fault?”

Philza’s eyes snap back to him. “What?”

“Do you think it’s my fault?” He says, nervously, “I was the only one with him in Pogtopia for a while. He was my brother. Was I just, not enough for him to keep his head? Should I have done more? I tried Phil, I did I swear. But-“ Tommy breathes out slowly, his voice going cracky with tears. 

Phil sits on the bed beside him. “Tommy, look at me.” He says. Tommy does. He’s got a quiet sort of intensity in his eyes. “You have absolutely nothing to blame yourself for, okay? Keeping Wilbur’s sanity in tact was not your responsibility. You did amazing, Tommy. None of this is on you. I’m sorry I can’t fix any of it, I can’t make it simple, but I can promise you that.”

Tommy nods and leans his head against Phil’s arm. He knows that he’s right. There was nothing in the world Tommy could have done. But that doesn’t stop his brain from churning out  _what if’s_ and guilt. 

“I want to fix it,” Phil mutters. “I really do.”

“You can’t fix it,” Tommy says, his voice heavy. “It’s shattered. And it’s not anyone’s fault, I don’t think.”

Dreams and ghosts make moving on a difficult feat. Especially when the dreams are just memories and the ghost isn’t quite right. The dreams are just ugly echoes. The ghost is a shaky approximation of the good things his brother was. None of the bad, the bitter, the angry. All repression and no despair. That’s how he knows it’s not really Wilbur. 

That’s a bit sad isn’t it? The distinction is in the negative. The dreams and the ghost differ in their portrayal, which thrust Tommy deeper into twisted confusion. 

Wilbur was a good brother once. He took care of Tommy, protected him and loved him. But Tommy figures _that _ Wilbur was dead long before Phil put a blade through him. 

Wilbur’s jacket smells of memories and ghosts. It smells like flowers and smoke. When Tommy closes his eyes, he sees Wilbur in red and blue. He doesn’t know which he prefers. But he knows despite it all, he still misses his brother. 

Grief is a funny thing. Strange and personal and collective. You can hate and hate and love and love and through all the tangled knots of emotion, you still miss a person when they’re gone. And Tommy misses his Wilbur. And Phil does. And so do Fundy and Techno and Tubbo. 

And it’s fucked up. But that doesn’t make it any less true. 

That night Phil stays with him until he falls back asleep. 

Tommy still dreams of Wil. 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading! if you liked it leave a comment i triple dog dare you. 
> 
> Byee


End file.
